McCracken looks at the places where culture and commerce, anthropology and economics meet most often: marketing in general, branding in particular, popular culture, Hollywood, advertising, television, magazines, and new media. Through his highly-customized ethnographic and anthropological research, he provides clients with a comprehensive but incisive review of contemporary culture, its foundations, current state and future trends and strategies for managing it.

McCracken has done ethnographic and anthropological work for corporations such as Chrysler, Coca-Cola, Diageo, General Mills, HP, IKEA, Subway, Unilever, Microsoft and Kodak among others.

Link of interest:
www.cultureby.com

See and hear how McDonald's is strengthening its bond with the global youth culture through it's new Olympic-themed online game, The Lost Ring. Sebastian will present the unique branding approach to developing this very cool alternate reality game. (The game launched in March 2008 and continues through the closing ceremony of the actual Olympic games on August 24th, 2008)

Links of interest:
www.thelostring.com
olympics.wikibruce.com/Beginners_Guide

Brand communities evolve from the energies of willing individuals who are so passionate about a brand they want to share the good news with others. How do you harness the evangelical impulse of these customers and manage the politics of others? Listen to four companies representing global, national and regional brands who have built destinations for their customers, employees and the general public. They will share both their challenges and successes of building brand communities.

Links of interest:
William Azaroff:
www.azaroff.com

William Bakker:
www.wilhelmus.ca

If Web 2.0 is the business revolution of the internet platform, how can marketers measure their investment and demonstrate positive ROI? Can emerging metrics be linked to traditional measures of success or is a new currency of engagement upon us? This panel of leading social media pioneers will share their experience of developing new models that capture and quantify engagement so brand marketers can make decisions that will build equity for tomorrow.

• Measuring Success in Social Media, John Owen (pdf, 1.5 MB)
• Measuring the Effect of a Facebook Application on Brand Health, Luc Cormier (pdf, 314 KB)

Search Engines are delivering more integrated search result pages that include videos, images, online press releases, and local listings. How do you leverage your online assets to drive more traffic and visitors your website?

Links of interest:
Vanessa Fox:
www.vanessafoxnude.com

The dialogue about your brand is happening in a much more transparent manner these days. Influencers have grown beyond just traditional media outlets to include bloggers, who reign in the online space and who can drastically affect perceptions about your brand, your campaigns and/or any other aspect of your company operations. Are you listening? If so, are you talking back? In the very least, you should be working to tell your side of the story; at best, maximizing your message impact among these powerful individuals. Our panel of experts will share the good the bad and the ugly about successful - and not so successful - approaches to online media relations.

Links of interest:
Rebecca Bollwitt:
www.miss604.com
www.radiozoom.net (podcast)
www.thecrazycanucks.com (podcast)
vancouver.metblogs.com

Darren Barefoot:
darrenbarefoot.com

Kate Trgovac:
mynameiskate.ca

• Making Memes, Darren Barefoot (pdf, 1 MB)
  A sample chapter from Getting to First Base: A Social Marketing Playbook.
• Blogger Relations presentation, Kate Trgovac (pdf, 5 MB)

Learn about Nokia's R&D lab and how to take advantage of the next emerging social media channel: mobile. Meet Brad Lowe, Nokia's Director of Product Creation for the Device Research and Design group, and Paul Burns, Director of IPTV, Mobile and Broadband at Sympatico MSN. Both will provide some great insights into the latest research trends and on how to merge content with advertising on new platforms and devices.

• The mobile device as the platform of the future, Brad Lowe (pdf, 2.8 MB)

More people are spending more time online for more reasons - by themselves and in virtual communities. Tools to identify and communicate with them on a tailored basis are evolving at an exponential rate, but is complete customization becoming the expectation rather than the exception in direct marketing?

This session will consider whether widespread broadband penetration will change the way brands need to communicate to large audiences to drive response, the importance of balancing awareness and relationships and the opportunities and potential pitfalls of being a true market leader in the digital realm.

• Entertainment Strategies: Captivating Digital Consumers & Revenues, Catherine Warren (pdf, 586 KB)